Chapter 2: New England Colonies

OBJECTIVES: Chapter 2: New England Colonies:

o We will examine the social and religious conditions that led to the establishment of the New England Colonies.

o We will examine the impact the Puritans had in New England.

o We will examine the early stages of the advancement of religious liberty.

o We will examine the relationship between the colonists and the native population.

“And the serpent cast out of his

mouth water as a flood after the

woman, that he might cause her to

be carried away of the flood. And

the earth helped the woman, and

the earth opened her mouth, and

swallowed up the flood which the

dragon cast out of his mouth.”

Revelation 12:15-16.

The Growth of New England • The first enduring settlement in

New England, the second in

English America resulted from

Puritan separatists who are

periodically imprisoned and even

executed from defying the

government and the Church of

England.

The Growth of New England • They considered leaving England

so they can worship freely.

• However the Puritans did not

believe in religious freedom of

others.

In Holland: • They had to work at unskilled and

poorly paid jobs.

• They were troubled by the effects of the tolerant society of the Dutch that threatened their dream of a close knit society.

• This resulted these separatists to move again to across the Atlantic to create the kind of community they wanted and where they could spread “the gospel of the Kingdom of Christ in those remote parts of the world.”

• Leaders of the Scrooby group obtained permission from the Virginia Company to settle in British America.

• This group was led by William Bradford.

• From the King they received informal assurances that they would be left alone.

• This was historic, opening the way for other dissenting Protestants to come to America.

• The migrating Puritans called themselves Pilgrims.

• In 1620 they left the port of Plymouth in the English Coast.

• On the Mayflower with thirty-five saints (Puritan Separatists)

• and 67 strangers (not full members of the church) aboard.

• My father descended from one of the Pilgrims who came to America in the ship May Flower, and landed upon Plymouth Rock, December, 1620. On board that ship was the father of Peregrine White, who wore a pair of silver knee-buckles, such as may be seen in the picture of the venerable signers of the Declaration of Independence. The knee-buckles worn by this man were afterward given to his son, Peregrine White, who was born on the passage to this country, with the request that they should be handed down in this line of the White family to the eldest son of each successive generation, whose name should be called John. My father had those buckles thirty years. James White: Life Incidents, page 9.

• The arrived in Cape Cod after exploring the region for a while, they chose a site for their settlement just north of the cape where Captain John Smith named “Plymouth.”

• Before landing, 41 male passengers signed a document, the Mayflower compact which established a civil government and proclaimed their allegiance to the King.

• The arrived in Cape Cod after exploring the region for a while, they chose a site for their settlement just north of the cape where Captain John Smith named “Plymouth.”

• Before landing, 41 male passengers signed a document, the Mayflower compact which established a civil government and proclaimed their allegiance to the King.

• Then on December 21, 1620 stepped ashore on Plymouth rock.

• During the first winter half of the colonists died of malnutrition, disease, and exposure. Still the colony survived.

• The Pilgrims presence altered the area they settled.

• They brought small pox that all but eliminated the Indian population around Plymouth in the early 1630s.

• The English demand for

furs, animal skins, and

meat greatly depleted the

number of wild animals

around Plymouth.

• This is why the Pilgrims

worked so hard to develop

stocks of domestic

animals such as horses,

cattle, sheep, and hogs.

• The Pilgrims and later English settlers also introduced new crops (wheat, barley, oats and others)

• While incorporating many native foods (among them corn, potatoes, and peas) into their own diet.

• The settlers also brought the concept of private property as they fenced in their land for cultivation.

• Relations with Indians were relatively friendly because both groups needed each other for survival.

• The Indians in this region were weaker because many died of disease.

• Squanto and Samoset showed them how to gather seafood, cultivate corn, and hunt local animals.

• Thanksgiving was celebrated for the harvest that resulted from this cooperation.

• The Plymouth colony was always a poor colony

• They held to the belief that God put them in the New World to live in a truly Christian community.

• And were content with their lives there.

• And the colony was relatively tolerant.

Puritans • Growing persecution against

Puritans in Great Britain further pulled new settlers to the colonies.

• Kings James asserted divine right and had harsh repressive policies towards Puritans.

• His son Charles I favored Roman Catholicism and tried to destroy religious non conformity.

• Charles I imprisoned Puritans for their beliefs.

Puritans • During this turmoil, a group of Puritan Merchants

planned to find opportunities in the New World.

• At first it was largely economic.

• They received a charter to colonize New England from Charles who seemed unaware they were Puritan.

• The charter created the Massachusetts Bay Company.

• Within the company there were a number of Puritans who saw New England as a haven for Puritans.

• Members of this faction met secretly and agreed to buy out the other investors and move in mass to America.

• John Winthrop was chosen as governor.

• He was University educated deep piety, and forceful character.

• He organized a expedition to New England in 1630 with seventeen ships and a 1000 people.

• Mostly families.

• It was the single largest migration of its kind in the seventeenth century.

• Winthrop also carried with him

the charter of the Massachusetts

Bay Company, that meant the

colonists would be responsible to

no company officials in England

only to themselves (Self

Government).

• Boston became the company’s headquarters and the colony’s capital.

• The Company soon transformed into a colonial government.

• According to the original company charter, the eight stockholders or freemen were to meet as a general court to choose officers and adopt rules for the corporation.

• The definition of “freemen” changed to include all male citizens, not just stockholders.

Puritans

• Unlike the separatist founders of Plymouth, these Puritans had no desire to break off from the Church of England.

• Yet they didn’t seem to really care if they were part of the church. They were different.

• Anglican churches were highly centralized churches.

• The Puritans in New England had each congregation choose their own ministers and regulate their own affairs.

Puritans

• These were known as Congregational Churches.

• They worshipped different than the Anglican Church.

• They did not follow traditional ceremonial worship and did not receive sacraments from priests.

• They leaned, instead, from reading the Bible and from listening to ministers who spoke from their own knowledge and belief, and not through the traditions of an institutional faith.

Puritans

• They accepted the theology of John Calvin,

that everyone was destined at birth for

either salvation or damnation.

• That nothing in people’s earthly lives could

change the fate after death.

• But living a good and productive life might

be a sign of salvation.

• Puritans not only sought salvation, they also sought freedom, freedom of worship without the interference from England or the established churches.

• But they also believed in obedience to authority.

• But authority was based largely within the community itself and monitored by its members

• It did not come from England or from centralized institutions in America.

• They believed in thrift and hard work, a commitment to lead useful lives, and material success was a sign that God honored them.

• Winthrop believed in “city upon a

hill.”

• A beacon of light.

• If Massachusetts was to become

a beacon to other emigrants it

had first to maintain its own

holiness.

Puritans Were Different:

• Ministers had no formal political power, but

they exerted great influence on church

members, who were the only people who

could vote or hold office.

• The government in turn protected the ministers, taxed the people (members and nonmembers alike) to support the church.

• Enforce the law required attendance for church.

• Dissidents had no more freedom of worship in America than the Puritans themselves had in England.

• This colony was in many ways a “theocracy” a society in which the line between the church and the state was hard to see.

• To make that point, the

Massachusetts government

executed four Quakers and

burned their books.

• The Puritans feared that God

would punish any people who

tolerated individual choice in

religion.

1Jn_4:19 We love him, because

he first loved us.

Challenges and Prosperity

• The colony’s first winter was severe and a third of the colonists died.

• Others left the colony in the spring.

• But more rapidly than other colonies, it grew and prospered.

• The Pilgrims and neighboring Indians helped them with food and advice.

• Affluent incoming settlers brought tools and other goods which they exchanged for the cattle, corn, and other produce of the established colonists and natives.

Challenges and Prosperity

• The large number of family groups in the

colony helped ensure a feeling of

commitment to community and a sense of

order among the settlers.

• The population reproduced more quickly

and the strong religious and political

hierarchy ensured social stability.

Expansion of New England:

• As the population grew, more and more,

people arrived in Massachusetts who were

not Puritan “saints” and could not vote.

• They had a choice to stay and conform to

the religion of the colony or leave which

many did and began their own colonies.

• These new colonies were established all

around what is now Connecticut.

The Call for Religious Liberty • Roger Williams, who was a young minster

in Salem.

• He was thought of as a good man but had controversial views in that society.

• Including the call for the Massachusetts Church should abandon all allegiance to the Church of England.

• He also called for a complete separation of church and state

• He believed this would protect the church from the corruption of the secular world.

The Call for Religious Liberty

• He was banished for these views because it threatened the colonies authority.

• Williams took refuge with Narragansett tribesmen, that following spring he bought a tract of land from them, and with a few followers founded the town of Providence.

The Call for Religious Liberty • This would later become Rhode Island.

• In 1644 he obtained a charter from Parliament permitting him to establish a government.

• Rhode Island’s government gave no support to the church and allowed religious liberty.

• It was a colony where all faiths including Jews could worship without interference.

Ann Hutchinson • Hutchinson was an intelligent and

charismatic woman.

• But she antagonized leaders of the clergy arguing that the ministers except a small few were not part of the elect.

• She was not a deferential type

• with a following among women, merchants, and young men and dissidents who resented the oppressive character of the colonial government.

• As her influence grew the leadership sought to remove her.

Ann Hutchinson • Hutchinson when placed on trial

embarrassed her accusers with her knowledge of theology.

• But her claim to directly communicate with the Holy Spirit caused her to be banished from the colony.

• Her unorthodox views challenged both religious and social order in the colony.

• She would later move to Rhode Island and then to New Netherland where she was killed in an Indian uprising.

Conflict with Native Americans:

• Indians were less powerful rivals to the early New England immigrants than natives were to the English settlers farther South.

• By the 1630s many natives succumbed to disease.

• The Surviving Indians sold much of their land to the English.

• Some natives called “praying Indians” even converted to Christianity and joined Puritan communities.

Conflict with Native Americans:

• Natives provided early settlers as they tried to adapt to the new land.

• Whites learned from the natives about vital local food crops; corn, beans, pumpkins, and potatoes.

• They also learned such crucial agricultural techniques as annual burning for fertilization.

• And planting beans to replenish exhausted soil.

Conflict with Native Americans:

• Natives also served as important trading partners, especially with the Fur trade.

• But White settlers desire to expand their land caused conflict and tension.

• They needed more land to raise domesticated (farm) animals.

• At first Puritan attitude toward Natives with slightly condescending admiration.

• Before long, they were thought of as heathens and savages.

Conflict with Native Americans:

• Some thought the solution was to civilized the natives by converting them to Christianity and the European ways and some missionaries had success.

• European settlers were clearing away forests and land that Indians depended on for food.

• Because of both disease and expansion, Natives who were some 100,000 at the start of the Seventeenth century have been reduced to 10,000 by 1675.

The Pequot War, King Philips War and the Technology of Battle.

• First major conflict was in 1637 called the Pequot War.

• It broke out between English settlers and the Pequot Indians because of competition over trade with the Dutch.

• And also friction over land.

• This war happened in the Connecticut Valley.

• The greatest savagery came from the English.

• Where Captain John Mason burned down a Pequot stronghold burning to death hundreds and enslaving those who survived.

The Pequot War, King Philips War and the Technology of Battle.

• The most prolonged and deadly encounter began in 1675,

• A conflict that the English would remember for generations as King Philips War.

• King Philip as the settlers called him, led his tribe the Wampanoags to resist the English.

• The English settlers began to expand upon the Tribe’s lands.

• And the tribe responded by force.

The Pequot War, King Philips War and the Technology of Battle.

• For three years Natives, well organized and armed with guns terrorized White towns in Massachusetts, causing the death of at least a thousand settlers.

• But the settlers enlisted the help of rival tribes such as the Mohawks and Indians Christian converts that turned the table and defeated them.

The Pequot War, King Philips War and the Technology of Battle.

• Indians also utilized the lighter flintlock rifles they acquired from trade and learned to repair them and manufacture spare parts.

• The settlers relied on the more clumsy matchlocks that they had to light with a match to fire.

• However, the tribe was weakened by disease

• And the overwhelming pouring of settlers.

• And was unable to continue resistance.

“If it be possible, as much as lieth

in you, live peaceably with all

men.” Romans 12:18

“Let nothing be done through strife

or vainglory; but in lowliness of

mind let each esteem other better

than themselves.” Philippians 2:3